Just when you thought gaming had become a bit stale and predictable, up pops one of the 90’s greatest games remastered and in HD, “Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD” bursts onto XBLA for this years Xbox Summer of Arcade.
If you have been playing games for as long as I have you will remember during the 90’s that Tony Hawk’s ruled the Ps1 and was the ‘must have’ game just like the first person shooters of today, Tony Hawk ruled.
So you can imagine my delight when it came up for download on the XBLA. Anyway enough of me let’s have a quick walkthrough of the game.
Tony Hawks Pro Skater HD is a combination of both Pro Skater 1 & 2, they have basically taken the best bits from both games and mixed them together with some fresh ideas, which I will talk through later.
The Parks
We have 7 to choose from, 3 from the first game and 4 from the second that include “Warehouse, School 2, The Hanger, Mall, Venice Beach, Downhill Jam (my personal favourite) and finally Marseille.” It’s fabulous to re-live these wonderful, exciting and sometimes infuriating yet addictive skate parks. There is confirmation of future DLC plans that will include some levels from THPS 3 which I am dead excited to play on.
Game Modes
There are classic game modes up for play including, “Career, Single Session and Free Skate.” But since its release back in 1999 the gaming industry has grown massively especially with online gaming they have taken advantage of this and put in four online game modes, the best one of the lot has to be “Big Head Elimination” where the idea is to perform tricks and land combo moves to shrink the size of your head before exploding, leaving you headless until the other players lose their heads resulting in a frantic display of chaos and fun trying to be the last man (Skater) standing.
The Music
A mixture of new and old ones which does help to bring those memories back of playing the game almost every hour of every day haha.
Gameplay
Nothing has changed it’s the same as it was back in ’99 so after an hour of playing you will feel like you have time travelled back 13yrs ago and you’ll be pulling off some sick flips and grabs and loving it with the benefit of playing it in HD which brings everything to life such as the colours, the skaters and pretty much everything THPS has to offer yet maintaining that classic playability.
Oh did I mention you can play as your avatar as well? Seeing your avatar pull off tricks and grinds will bring an even bigger smile to your face.
To summarise, it’s great to see an awesome game from our past like THPS 1 and 2 get the 21st century treatment, it brings back some great memories and at a mere 1200 MSP this is certainly a game worth purchasing and reliving your youth even if it’s only for a few hours a day. Get playing and SCORE BIG! See you on those leaderboards.
Both PS3 and PC dates are still to be confirmed.
JonnyB
